Well I sent off my proposal to my committee today afternoon, after cleaning up the last round of corrections from my boss (the last of what was literally DOZENS of rounds of corrections and suggestions and drafts and corrections of corrections being passed between me and him). I'm meeting with them on Friday if nothing falls through, so hopefully I'll get actual feedback and suggestions without getting my proposed experiments either tripled in scope or dismissed as too old-fashioned. But to be honest, I have the luxury/curse of having an old respected curmudgeon for a boss, who's been doing this for longer than I've been sentient, so I'm confident that for my lab, the highest hurdle to jump is the very first one.